USA

ByCompiled from wire service reports by Robert Kilborn and Kristen Broman-WorthingtonJuly 29, 2002

After a three-day rescue effort, all nine men trapped in a flooded western Pennsylvania coal mine emerged safely early Sunday, hauled 240 feet to the surface in a tube-shaped cage. The men were in "remarkably good shape," doctors said, after they spent 77 hours in three to four feet of cold water. The Quecreek Mine, 60 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, flooded last Wednesday after the miners hit an unmarked shaft that had been abandoned since the 1950s.

Secretary of State Powell said he plans to meet with Palestinian officials next month on reforming their security operations, after talks with an Israeli delegation last week. Powell spoke Sunday during visits to India and Pakistan aimed at reducing tensions over disputed Kashmir. Lead Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said he would be among those attending the talks in Washington.

The US also will meet next month in Washington with Iraqi opposition groups that want to overthrow President Saddam Hussein, according to a spokes-man for one such group, the London-based Iraqi National Congress. The State Department confirmed that a coordination meeting was planned for Aug. 9 or Aug. 16. Six groups, including those representing Iraq's Shiite Muslim and Kurdish populations, were invited to attend. President Bush has made removal of the Iraqi leader a major policy goal.

A corporate reform bill approved by Congress late last week "will help reassure Americans that our economic system is sound and fair," Bush said in his weekly radio address Saturday. Treasury Secretary O'Neill echoed that theme in television appearances Sunday. Bush also urged the Senate to follow the House's lead by passing legislation that would grant him "fast track" authority to negotiate trade agreements and create a Department of Homeland Security, before the month-long August recess.

A homeless man was charged in Clayton, Mo., with the murder, kidnapping, and attempted rape of six-year-old Cassandra Williamson. Police Chief Ron Battelle told NBC's "Today" show that Johnny Johnson had confessed to the killing. Johnson reportedly was a houseguest at the girl's residence and was the last person seen with her before she disappeared last Friday morning.

Police in Dallas were searching for 20 suspected illegal immigrants after capturing a similar number who fled a tractor-trailer, later found with two corpses inside. The rig had completed a 10-hour trip from Mexico in temperatures above 90 degrees F. Several detainees were treated for heat-related illness.